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Here’s eight grand to adopt our textbook

I got the following email this morning. Note the part I’ve underlined:

***

Dear Introductory Psychology Professor:

[Redacted] Press was created as a faculty venture six years ago focusing solely on interactive low cost digital text packages with free printed texts. This concept has been widely accepted by faculty and students alike. The rising price of textbooks is well known to college faculty, students, and even government agencies. Our digital textbooks offer a low cost alternative to traditional expensive textbooks.
We would like to introduce you to our Introductory Psychology low cost interactive package including:

A $40 digital interactive text with embedded videos and audio and words with internet links — a better way for today’s students
A free printed text called a student text supplement
Access to a password protected website with interactive updates and materials
A test marketing program with stipends up to $8,000 for individual professors and up to $15,000 or more for departments
An online test center for each chapter of the interactive text, plus instructor’s manual
Test bank questions to upload to any online platform such as Blackboard
Technical and consulting support — 24/7
We invite you to take a narrated tour of [Redacted] Press before you review the interactive Introductory Psychology text. It is a brief tour of [Redacted] Press and interactive texts and will enable you to better understand the benefits of our program within minutes. You start the tour by going to: [URL redacted] (you can cut and paste this URL directly into your browser).This tour will demonstrate the interactive elements of our texts and give you an opportunity to review the [Redacted] interactive Introductory Psychology text at your leisure.

After you have taken the tour, if you email me your mailing address and the number of students in your upcoming classes, we will send you the digital text and brochure on the Introductory Psychology package and tailor a test marketing stipend program for you and even for your department.

We are confident you will see the numerous advantages of moving towards digital, interactive texts and will help us faculty move students into the digital age of education.

Thank you in advance for your time and interest,

***

I went to the website and looked at the text briefly, and I wouldn’t ask a student to pay $40 for it. It’s just not that good, and for a few bucks more, a student can get an ebook edition of a name-brand textbook.

But more to the point, is it just me, or does that “test marketing program” sound like a pretext for a kickback? Awfully close to the consulting fees and conference junkets that doctors and pharmaceutical companies are always getting in trouble for.

(Of course, I’m also suspicious of the numbers. At $40 a pop, you’d need to sell 200 ebooks just to cover the $8000 kickback stipend.)